


holding your half of my smile

by orphan_account



Category: Free!
Genre: Drabble, M/M, post-confession
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-13
Updated: 2014-01-13
Packaged: 2018-01-08 15:58:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1134648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Say it again, Makoto.</p>
            </blockquote>





	holding your half of my smile

**Author's Note:**

> So there are like eighty confession scenarios in my head. In the end I couldn't even write the confession itself (perhaps that will come some other day)...

The wind sweeps all the leaves off to the left side of the steps at the shrine when Haru finally slows his pace, stops and turns. He’s still holding onto his half of their popsicle; it’s half-eaten and dripping pale blue onto the concrete at his feet. Makoto notices that his clothes are still clean and realizes that there is more than one miracle in the world.

“You really like me,” Haru says. Not a question.

Their walk home from the convenience store was hinged tight around the hook of a question mark, curling deep into Makoto’s spine, numbing him from the inside out as he struggled to keep up with his friend - despite having longer legs. Haru always walked with more purpose and force than he did, anyway. Makoto’s stomach clenched with each step he took, clenched so hard that he could barely move, and the feeling was alien, panic flooding into his forehead, washing out his eyes until they were so bright even in the daylight that he had to close them slightly to stop the stinging.

Haru continues, always calmly, deliberately: “You love me.”

The popsicle in his hand starts rotating from its eight-five, eight-seven degree angle against the ground, tilting now at somewhere between sixty-two and sixty-five, maybe.

Makoto’s mouth opens. He never could make Haru wait for him, after all. “Yes,” he says helplessly.

The corner of Haru’s mouth quirks up and he takes a bite of his popsicle at last, teeth sinking cleanly into the bluish treat. Not all of the juice makes it into his mouth and Makoto realizes that he’s swallowing too, inadvertently, and also that his own half of the popsicle had fallen out of his hand and onto the sidewalk at some point. Haru licks the corner of his mouth, the corner holding the half-smile, and he says: “Say it again, Makoto.”

He says it again. A question. “I… love you…?”

Haru’s voice is low and close. “Again.”

“I love you, Haru.”

Haru presses the other half of his smile into Makoto’s mouth and Makoto tastes sweet, sweet, _sweet_ on his tongue. “Good, because I love Makoto, too.”


End file.
